Where does David Lynch go to find the dreamscapes that mystify and unnerve us? The Twin Peaks director draws back the curtain with writer Mitch Horowitz.

David Lynch on Meditation and 'Catching the Big Fish'

May 18, 2017

Twin Peaks director David Lynch is famously elusive about what his movies and tv series mean, or where his ideas come from. In films like Mulholland Drive, Blue Velvet and The Elephant Man, he submerges us in the dark and foreboding currents of the subconscious. So how does he come up with this stuff? Well, the way he tells it, every morning since 1973, he has gotten up...closed his eyes…slowed down his breathing…and 'gone fishing' in the ocean he calls the 'unified field,' using Transcendental Meditation. He spoke to Mitch Horowitz, on this tenth anniversary of his book, Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness and Creativity.

Lynch's new season of Twin Peaks debuts on Showtime on May 21. This interview originally aired in November, 2016.

"Ideas are like fish. If you want to catch little fish, you can stay in the shallow water. But if you want to catch the big fish, you’ve got to go deeper. Down deep, the fish are more powerful and more pure. They’re huge and abstract. And they’re very beautiful."

Mitch Horowitz in the Argot Studios in New York.

David Lynch: Uncut

May 18, 2017

Behold our never-before-heard, barely edited interview with David Lynch, first recorded with Mitch Horowitz in November 2016. It covers subjects including: the organic beauty of celluloid film, why he feels he has overcome his anger issues, and whether there are dark forces in the world....

"For sure; you just gotta look around, you can feel it. You can feel things going on. You might not be able to see it, but you can feel it. But there’s a lot of negativity that’s gotta go; and there’s always been the very, very good, and the very, very bad swimming in the same sea. And it’s just a question of balance."

Transcendental Meditation's West Coast Roots

May 18, 2017

Although it originated in ancient India, Transcendental Meditation has only been popular in the United States since the early 1960s. That’s when a man with a twinkle in his eye named Maharishi Mahesh Yogi taught an updated version of the meditation practice that spread throughout the West Coast. After its embrace by the Beatles, it faded from popular view. But then in the early 2000s, director David Lynch brought it back into the spotlight. We asked Erik Davis to put this all in context for us. He spoke to producer Laura Kwerel. This interview originally aired in November, 2016.

Mindfulness meditation was once practiced mostly by Buddhist monks and nuns. Now it's practiced by CEOs, teachers, politicians, and basically anyone who wants to take the edge off life. So how did mindfulness meditation transform from something passed down from Buddhist elders into a popular prescription for the ills of the middle class? Jeff Wilson spoke to Maureen in 2014.